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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 1,351 records · Page 75
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1988

Direct solution for thermal stresses in a nose cap under an arbitrary axisymmetric temperature distribution

The design of a nose cap for a hypersonic vehicle is an iterative process requiring a rapid, easy to use and accurate stress analysis. The objective of this paper is to develop such a stress analysis technique from a direct solution of the thermal stress equations for a spherical shell. The nose cap structure is treated as a thin spherical shell with an axisymmetric temperature distribution. The governing differential equations are solved by expressing the stress solution to the thermoelastic equations in terms of a series of derivatives of the Legendre polynomials. The process of finding the coefficients for the series solution in terms of the temperature distribution is generalized by expressing the temperature along the shell and through the thickness as a polynomial in the spherical angle coordinate. Under this generalization the orthogonality property of the Legendre polynomials leads to a sequence of integrals involving powers of the spherical shell coordinate times the derivative of the Legendre polynomials. The coefficients of the temperature polynomial appear outside of these integrals. Thus, the integrals are evaluated only once and their values tabulated for use with any arbitrary polynomial temperature distribution.

Davis, Randall C.↗
NASA NTRS1995

Potential theoretic methods for far field sound radiation calculations

In the area of computational acoustics, procedures which accurately predict the far-field sound radiation are much sought after. A systematic development of such procedures are found in a sequence of papers by Atassi. The method presented here is an alternate approach to predicting far field sound based on simple layer potential theoretic methods. The main advantages of this method are: it requires only a simple free space Green's function, it can accommodate arbitrary shapes of Kirchoff surfaces, and is readily extendable to three-dimensional problems. Moreover, the procedure presented here, though tested for unsteady lifting airfoil problems, can easily be adapted to other areas of interest, such as jet noise radiation problems. Results are presented for lifting airfoil problems and comparisons are made with the results reported by Atassi. Direct comparisons are also made for the flat plate case.

Hariharan, S. I.↗
NASA NTRS1997

Trans-Laminar-Reinforced (TLR) Composites

A Trans-Laminar-Reinforced (TLR) composite is defined as composite laminate with up to five percent volume of fibrous reinforcement oriented in a 'trans-laminar' fashion in the through-thickness direction. The TLR can be continuous threads as in 'stitched laminates', or it can be discontinuous rods or pins as in 'Z-Fiber(TM) materials. It has been repeatedly documented in the literature that adding TLR to an otherwise two dimensional laminate results in the following advantages: substantially improved compression-after-impact response; considerably increased fracture toughness in mode 1 (double cantilever beam) and mode 2 (end notch flexure); and severely restricted size and growth of impact damage and edge delamination. TLR has also been used to eliminate catastrophic stiffener disbonding in stiffened structures. TLR directly supports the 'Achilles heel' of laminated composites, that is delamination. As little as one percent volume of TLR significantly alters the mechanical response of laminates. The objective of this work was to characterize the effects of TLR on the in-plane and inter-laminar mechanical response of undamaged composite laminates. Detailed finite element models of 'unit cells', or representative volumes, were used to study the effects of adding TLR on the elastic constants; the in-plane strength; and the initiation of delamination. Parameters investigated included TLR material, TLR volume fraction, TLR diameter, TLR through-thickness angle, ply stacking sequence, and the microstructural features of pure resin regions and curved in-plane fibers. The work was limited to the linear response of undamaged material with at least one ply interface. An inter-laminar dominated problem of practical interest, a flanged skin in bending, was also modeled.

Hinders, Mark↗
NASA NTRS2006

Operational Concept for Flight Crews to Participate in Merging and Spacing of Aircraft

The predicted tripling of air traffic within the next 15 years is expected to cause significant aircraft delays and create a major financial burden for the airline industry unless the capacity of the National Airspace System can be increased. One approach to improve throughput and reduce delay is to develop new ground tools, airborne tools, and procedures to reduce the variance of aircraft delivery to the airport, thereby providing an increase in runway throughput capacity and a reduction in arrival aircraft delay. The first phase of the Merging and Spacing Concept employs a ground based tool used by Air Traffic Control that creates an arrival time to the runway threshold based on the aircraft s current position and speed, then makes minor adjustments to that schedule to accommodate runway throughput constraints such as weather and wake vortex separation criteria. The Merging and Spacing Concept also employs arrival routing that begins at an en route metering fix at altitude and continues to the runway threshold with defined lateral, vertical, and velocity criteria. This allows the desired spacing interval between aircraft at the runway to be translated back in time and space to the metering fix. The tool then calculates a specific speed for each aircraft to fly while enroute to the metering fix based on the adjusted land timing for that aircraft. This speed is data-linked to the crew who fly this speed, causing the aircraft to arrive at the metering fix with the assigned spacing interval behind the previous aircraft in the landing sequence. The second phase of the Merging and Spacing Concept increases the timing precision of the aircraft delivery to the runway threshold by having flight crews using an airborne system make minor speed changes during enroute, descent, and arrival phases of flight. These speed changes are based on broadcast aircraft state data to determine the difference between the actual and assigned time interval between the aircraft pair. The airborne software then calculates a speed adjustment to null that difference over the remaining flight trajectory. Follow-on phases still under development will expand the concept to all types of aircraft, arriving from any direction, merging at different fixes and altitudes, and to any airport. This paper describes the implementation phases of the Merging and Spacing Concept, and provides high-level results of research conducted to date.

Baxley, Brian T.↗
NASA NTRS2000

Methods for forming group III-V arsenide-nitride semiconductor materials

Methods are disclosed for forming Group III--arsenide-nitride semiconductor materials. Group III elements are combined with group V elements, including at least nitrogen and arsenic, in concentrations chosen to lattice match commercially available crystalline substrates. Epitaxial growth of these III-V crystals results in direct bandgap materials, which can be used in applications such as light emitting diodes and lasers. Varying the concentrations of the elements in the III-V crystals varies the bandgaps, such that materials emitting light spanning the visible spectra, as well as mid-IR and near-UV emitters, can be created. Conversely, such material can be used to create devices that acquire light and convert the light to electricity, for applications such as full color photodetectors and solar energy collectors. The growth of the III-V crystals can be accomplished by growing thin layers of elements or compounds in sequences that result in the overall lattice match and bandgap desired.

Major, Jo S.↗
NASA NTRS2000

III-V arsenide-nitride semiconductor

III-V arsenide-nitride semiconductor are disclosed. Group III elements are combined with group V elements, including at least nitrogen and arsenic, in concentrations chosen to lattice match commercially available crystalline substrates. Epitaxial growth of these III-V crystals results in direct bandgap materials, which can be used in applications such as light emitting diodes and lasers. Varying the concentrations of the elements in the III-V materials varies the bandgaps, such that materials emitting light spanning the visible spectra, as well as mid-IR and near-UV emitters, can be created. Conversely, such material can be used to create devices that acquire light and convert the light to electricity, for applications such as full color photodetectors and solar energy collectors. The growth of the III-V material can be accomplished by growing thin layers of elements or compounds in sequences that result in the overall lattice match and bandgap desired.

Major, Jo S.↗
NASA NTRS2002

Methods for forming group III-arsenide-nitride semiconductor materials

Methods are disclosed for forming Group III-arsenide-nitride semiconductor materials. Group III elements are combined with group V elements, including at least nitrogen and arsenic, in concentrations chosen to lattice match commercially available crystalline substrates. Epitaxial growth of these III-V crystals results in direct bandgap materials, which can be used in applications such as light emitting diodes and lasers. Varying the concentrations of the elements in the III-V crystals varies the bandgaps, such that materials emitting light spanning the visible spectra, as well as mid-IR and near-UV emitters, can be created. Conversely, such material can be used to create devices that acquire light and convert the light to electricity, for applications such as full color photodetectors and solar energy collectors. The growth of the III-V crystals can be accomplished by growing thin layers of elements or compounds in sequences that result in the overall lattice match and bandgap desired.

Major, Jo S.↗
NASA NTRS1997

III-V aresenide-nitride semiconductor materials and devices

III-V arsenide-nitride semiconductor crystals, methods for producing such crystals and devices employing such crystals. Group III elements are combined with group V elements, including at least nitrogen and arsenic, in concentrations chosen to lattice match commercially available crystalline substrates. Epitaxial growth of these III-V crystals results in direct bandgap materials, which can be used in applications such as light emitting diodes and lasers. Varying the concentrations of the elements in the III-V crystals varies the bandgaps, such that materials emitting light spanning the visible spectra, as well as mid-IR and near-UV emitters, can be created. Conversely, such material can be used to create devices that acquire light and convert the light to electricity, for applications such as full color photodetectors and solar energy collectors. The growth of the III-V crystals can be accomplished by growing thin layers of elements or compounds in sequences that result in the overall lattice match and bandgap desired.

Major, Jo S.↗
DOE OSTI2023

Inferring Viral Transmission Time from Phylogenies for Known Transmission Pairs

When the time of an HIV transmission event is unknown, methods to identify it from virus genetic data can reveal the circumstances that enable transmission. We developed a single-parameter Markov model to infer transmission time from an HIV phylogeny constructed of multiple virus sequences from people in a transmission pair. Our method finds the statistical support for transmission occurring in different possible time slices. We compared our time-slice model results to previously described methods: a tree-based logical transmission interval, a simple parsimony-like rules-based method, and a more complex coalescent model. Across simulations with multiple transmitted lineages, different transmission times relative to the source’s infection, and different sampling times relative to transmission, we found that overall our time-slice model provided accurate and narrower estimates of the time of transmission. We also identified situations when transmission time or direction was difficult to estimate by any method, particularly when transmission occurred long after the source was infected and when sampling occurred long after transmission. Applying our model to real HIV transmission pairs showed some agreement with facts known from the case investigations. We also found, however, that uncertainty on the inferred transmission time was driven more by uncertainty from time calibration of the phylogeny than from the model inference itself. Encouragingly, comparable performance of the Markov time-slice model and the coalescent model—which make use of different information within a tree—suggests that a new method remains to be described that will make full use of the topology and node times for improved transmission time inference.

59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2021

Multiagent-Based Dynamic Voltage Support of Power Converters During Fault Ride-Through

Reference point of applicability (RPA) is a predefined point in a distribution network that performance requirements shall apply. As RPA is not directly controlled by a dedicated distributed energy resource (DER), it requires an aggregate response of multiple DERs over a complex meshed network. Here, this article presents a multiagent-based distributed dynamic voltage support (DDVS) method for coordinated aggregate response of multiple DER units to support RPA voltage profile during and after fault ride-through. DDVS implements a multiagent-based leader target tracking scheme with velocity matching and flock centering features to avoid uncoordinated current injections of cooperative DERs. The DDVS is an event-based approach based on RPA requirements. Two-dimensional voltage support objective is handled: 1) coordinated positive sequence current injection for voltage magnitude boosting and 2) coordinated negative sequence current injection for unbalance voltage mitigation. The results demonstrate that the proposed DDVS algorithm addresses emerging coordinated DVS requirement of DERs.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗
DOE OSTI2023

Peatland hydrology across scale: a probabilistic framework for confronting variability, heterogeneity, and uncertainty (Final Report)

Our project aimed to guide the representations of peatland hydrology and water-carbon feedbacks within Earth System Models, by improving process understanding and developing parsimonious models that elucidate the effects of hydroclimatic variability and spatial heterogeneity. Our research questions centered on the three key drivers of peatland hydrology: (1) seasonal and interannual hydroclimatic fluctuations, (2) spatial heterogeneity of peatland microtopography, and (3) hydrological connectivity across landscape units within a peatland watershed. Our analyses and model testing used existing long-term datasets within the Marcell Experimental Forest (MEF), with new data collected whenever necessary. To date, we have demonstrated the strong influence of water table elevations on the temperature sensitivity of CH 4 emissions, using a newly developed eddy covariance dataset spanning eleven years at MEF. Specifically, higher water tables dampen the increase in CH 4 emissions in the spring as well as their decrease in the fall, resulting in hysteresis. These results imply that any hydroclimatological changes in peatlands that shift seasonal water availability from winter to summer will increase annual CH 4 emissions, even if soil temperature remains unchanged. To further investigate water table elevation change within the peatland microtopography, we installed automated water table gauges across four bog-forest transects (the “lagg”) in two peatland watersheds at MEF, which are hotspots of intense biogeochemical activity. These measurements will give us new information about the extent of lagg expansion and contraction during snowmelt and high intensity rainfall events, as well as the directionality of water and nutrient flow into the bog from the surrounding forests. Finally, we investigated the hydrological connectivity across the peatland watershed complex during early spring – a critical period where water table is elevated from snowmelt – using extended hydrological records from MEF (e.g., snow and frost depths, water table elevations, streamflow). The importance of thermal and wintertime processes within the Energy Exascale Earth System Model (E3SM) was determined through sensitivity analyses. Results from data analyses show that (i) streamflow has decreased over decades likely due to increased evapotranspiration rates (despite no detectable trends in precipitation), (ii) spring streamflow generation is controlled by a sequence of fill-and-spill pathways from the snowpack to the stream through peatland water stores, and (iii) frost depth is a key explanatory variable for the timing and magnitude of streamflow. These results suggest that frost plays an important role in connecting surface water storage in peatlands to stream outlets, and that the hydrological connectivity across the peatland watershed complex can mediate the sensitivity of hydrological responses to climate variations.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
NASA NTRS1981

Models for Jupiter's decametric arcs

Arc-shaped structures that dominate Jupiter's decametric emission are discussed in terms of a magnetic fine structure. The sequence of arcs manifest the occurence of widespread fine structures similar to the white ovals on Jupiter's visible surface. An arc concave toward increasing time occurs at the east limb passage, and an arc convex occurs at the west limb passage, which is consistent with the early source producing vertex early arcs, and the late source producing vertex late arcs. Due to the geometry of the Io plasma torus (IPT) which is arranged so that Io skims the northern surface of the IPT, for any connection between Io and Jupiter's surface that involves Alfven waves, the propagation time, the refraction and the directional defocusing of these waves must be strongly influenced by the amount of Alfven wave path length between the instantaneous position of Io and the surface of the IPT.

Warwick, J. W.↗
DOE OSTI2025

Microbial Enrichments Contribute to Characterization Of Desert Tortoise Gut Microbiota

Abstract Desert tortoises play ecologically significant roles, including plant seed dispersal and mineral cycling, and yet little is known about microbial members that are critical to their gut and overall health. Tortoises consume recalcitrant plant material, which their gut microbiota degrades and converts into usable metabolites and nutrients for the tortoise. Findings from tortoise gut microbiomes may translate well into biotechnological applications as these microbes have evolved to efficiently degrade recalcitrant substrates and generate useful products. In this study, we cultivated microbial communities from desert tortoise fecal samples following a targeted anaerobic enrichment for microbes involved in deconstruction and utilization of plant biomass. We employed 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing to compare cultivated communities to initial fecal source material and found high abundances of Firmicutes and Bacteroidota typically associated with biomass deconstruction in all cultivated samples. Significantly decreased microbial diversity was observed in the cultivated microbial communities, yet several key taxa thrived in lignocellulose enrichments, includingLachnospiraceaeandEnterococcus. Additionally, cultivated communities produced short-chain fatty acids under anaerobic conditions, and their growth and metabolic output provide evidence of their viability in the initial fecal communities. Overall, this study adds to the limited understanding of reptilian herbivore microbiota, and offers a path towards biotechnological translation based on the ability of the cultivated communities to convert lignocellulose directly to acetate, propionate, and butyrate.

Environmental Sciences & Ecology↗
DOE OSTI2025

Salt-Induced Polymorphs Observed in Colloidal Single Crystals

Polymorphs are solid materials with the same chemical composition but different crystallographic structures. A unique aspect of polymorphs is that they exhibit different physical properties, such as solubility, melting point, density, color, hardness, and bioavailability. Here, we synthesized polymorphs of colloidal crystals engineered with DNA by slow-cooling gold nanoparticle-core programmable atom equivalents (PAEs, particles with DNA sequences that control their bonding characteristics) under salt concentrations ranging from 0.5 to 4 M NaCl. This approach yielded a diverse set of single-crystalline phases with cubic, tetragonal, and hexagonal lattice symmetries. The structural transitions observed here arise solely from the modulation of interparticle repulsion via ionic strength and thermal processing. Notably, in certain cases, we observed diffusionless phase transformations, wherein the superlattices evolve from cubic to lower-symmetry tetragonal lattices. By tuning the thermal stability and salt concentration, we captured intermediate, metastable body-centered tetragonal structures during the slow-cool process, indicating that subtle changes in free energy can direct crystallization to low-symmetry phases. In conclusion, this study demonstrates that thermal and ionic parameters can be tuned to access and stabilize colloidal crystal polymorphs with emergent structures and interesting functional properties.

Colloidal crystallization↗
DOE OSTI2022

Identification of $\mathrm{IOMA}$-class neutralizing antibodies targeting the $\mathrm{CD4}$-binding site on the $\mathrm{HIV}$-1 envelope glycoprotein

A major goal of current HIV-1 vaccine design efforts is to induce broadly neutralizing antibodies (bNAbs). The VH1-2-derived bNAb IOMA directed to the CD4-binding site of the HIV-1 envelope glycoprotein is of interest because, unlike the better-known VH1-2-derived VRC01-class bNAbs, it does not require a rare short light chain complementarity-determining region 3 (CDRL3). Here, we describe three IOMA-class NAbs, ACS101-103, with up to 37% breadth, that share many characteristics with IOMA, including an average-length CDRL3. Cryo-electron microscopy revealed that ACS101 shares interactions with those observed with other VH1-2 and VH1-46-class bNAbs, but exhibits a unique binding mode to residues in loop D. Analysis of longitudinal sequences from the patient suggests that a transmitter/founder-virus lacking the N276 glycan might have initiated the development of these NAbs. Together these data strengthen the rationale for germline-targeting vaccination strategies to induce IOMA-class bNAbs and provide a wealth of sequence and structural information to support such strategies.

59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2024

Impact of the Earthquake Rupture on Ground-Motion Variability of the 24 August 2016 M w 6.2 Amatrice, Italy, Earthquake

Here, the devastating 24 August 2016 M w 6.2 earthquake that struck Amatrice, Italy, marked the beginning of a prolonged seismic sequence dominated by three subsequent M w ≥6.0 events in the central Apennines region. The earthquake destroyed Amatrice’s historic center, claiming the lives of 299 individuals and causing widespread damage in the neighboring villages. The severity of the ground shaking, with a recorded maximum acceleration of 850 cm/s 2 on the east–west component at the Amatrice station, was far greater than the predicted acceleration based on the Italian ground-motion model (GMM). As pointed out by several investigations, the observed ground-motion amplitude and its spatial variability during the earthquake can be linked to specific rupture characteristics, including slip distribution and rupture directivity effects revealed by the observed data (Tinti et al., 2016; Pischiutta et al., 2021). In this study, we conducted physics-based 3D numerical simulations of ground motion for the Amatrice earthquake for frequencies up to 3 Hz. We employed a series of kinematic rupture models and a well-constrained local 3D velocity model incorporating surface topography. The kinematic rupture realizations were generated using multiscale hybrid and fully stochastic models, following the technique proposed by Graves and Pitarka (2016). We focused on assessing the sensitivity of near-fault ground-motion amplitudes to earthquake rupture characteristics, in particular, the spatial slip pattern. To evaluate the quality of our simulations, we employed goodness-of-fit measurements performed in comparisons of simulated and recorded ground motions. The simulated ground motions compare well with the recorded data and predictions from GMMs for Italy, ITA18 (Lanzano et al., 2019). However, we found that the simulated interevent ground-motion variability (randomness in the source process) of peak ground velocity, σ (PGV) is higher than the constant σ (PGV) predicted by conventional GMMs. Our simulations using several rupture scenarios demonstrate that the near-fault ground-motion amplification pattern is directly related to the slip distribution pattern.

3D Ground Motions Simulations↗
NASA NTRS1998

Performance of Low Dissipative High Order Shock-Capturing Schemes for Shock-Turbulence Interactions

Accurate and efficient direct numerical simulation of turbulence in the presence of shock waves represents a significant challenge for numerical methods. The objective of this paper is to evaluate the performance of high order compact and non-compact central spatial differencing employing total variation diminishing (TVD) shock-capturing dissipations as characteristic based filters for two model problems combining shock wave and shear layer phenomena. A vortex pairing model evaluates the ability of the schemes to cope with shear layer instability and eddy shock waves, while a shock wave impingement on a spatially-evolving mixing layer model studies the accuracy of computation of vortices passing through a sequence of shock and expansion waves. A drastic increase in accuracy is observed if a suitable artificial compression formulation is applied to the TVD dissipations. With this modification to the filter step the fourth-order non-compact scheme shows improved results in comparison to second-order methods, while retaining the good shock resolution of the basic TVD scheme. For this characteristic based filter approach, however, the benefits of compact schemes or schemes with higher than fourth order are not sufficient to justify the higher complexity near the boundary and/or the additional computational cost.

Sandham, N. D.↗
NASA NTRS1998

Performance of Low Dissipative High Order Shock-Capturing Schemes for Shock-Turbulence Interactions

Abstract Accurate and efficient direct numerical simulation of turbulence in the presence of shock waves represents a significant challenge for numerical methods. The objective of this paper is to evaluate the performance of high order compact and non-compact central spatial differencing employing total variation diminishing (TVD) shock-capturing dissipations as characteristic based filters for two model problems combining shock wave and shear layer phenomena. A vortex pairing model evaluates the ability of the schemes to cope with shear layer instability and eddy shock waves, while a shock wave impingement on a spatially-evolving mixing layer model studies the accuracy of computation of vortices passing through a sequence of shock and expansion waves. A drastic increase in accuracy is observed if a suitable artificial compression formulation is applied to the TVD dissipations. With this modification to the filter step the fourth-order non-compact scheme shows improved results in comparison to second-order methods, while retaining the good shock resolution of the basic TVD scheme. For this characteristic based filter approach, however, the benefits of compact schemes or schemes with higher than fourth order are not sufficient to justify the higher complexity near the boundary and/or the additional computational cost.

Sandham, N. D.↗